Event Preview: Midwinter 2012

ALCTS Interest Groups

Administration of Collection Management Interest Group

If you have any interest in the administration of collection development or management please come and join us for a town hall-style meeting. We will discuss the future of this group and possible programming ideas for ALA Annual in Anaheim. This is your chance to help create something, so please do stop by.

ALCTS/LITA Authority Control Interest Group

Please join us for the on Sunday, January 22, 2012 at ALA Midwinter. The focus of the LITA/ALCTS Authority Control Interest Group meeting will be updates on special authority control projects.

Janis Young from the Library of Congress will give an update of the genre/forms projects at Library of Congress. Robert Bremer of OCLC will provide updates on VIAF and the genre/form implementation in WorldCat. Questions and discussion from the floor will be welcome.

A business meeting will be held after the program and everyone is invited to attend.

Book and Paper Interest Group

Sunday, January 22, 2012, 1:30–3:30 p.m.Dallas Convention Center D171

Join us for a variety of talks about exhibit issues. Some of the questions we will be exploring are:

Are people feeling greater pressure from their institutions to increase (or in some cases initiate) their exhibition presence, with exhibit calendars becoming more compressed?

What departments are defining the calendar of exhibits, their timing, and their focus? How much notice are people getting for changing exhibits? Are these changes included within their budgets, or are special resources allocated for them? Are people talking about long-term reallocation of staff time to address exhibit issues?

Are any institutions building new exhibit spaces for their collections, whether as part of an overall remodel or on an ad-hoc basis? Or are people working with their existing exhibit spaces, making do with what they have and putting a remodel request on their wish list?

Assuming people are including some online presence with their exhibitions, how has this online presence/workflow been incorporated into the existing resource/budget/staff framework? Is anyone using new media blogging/web outlets as a virtual “exhibition” presence and forgoing a physical exhibition space entirely?

Come hear how some of your colleagues have grappled with these questions. We look forward to seeing you in Dallas.

Cataloging & Classification Research Interest Group

In the current economic climate, libraries must adopt cost-effective methods to facilitate access to collections. Vendor-provided records enable access to individual titles when batch-loaded into the catalog, but often have substantial quality issues. In this year’s meeting, we explore the benefits, challenges, and best practices for batch-loading vendor catalog records. Following the presentations, there will be an opportunity for audience questions and a panel discussion of issues by the presenters.

“Batchloading: Current Practices and Future Challenges: A Survey of Large Research Libraries,” presented by Rebecca L. Mugridge MacIntosh, Head, Cataloging and Metadata Services, Penn State University Libraries.

A review of survey results showing how batchloading records for access to digital collections can impact staffing, budgets, workflow, and quality standards. The data also examines how batchloading activities are managed within libraries, how information technology issues support and/or hinder batchloading activities, and how libraries assess the effectiveness of batch loading.

“Quality Issues in Vendor-provided Records for E-books,” presented by Stacie Traill, Cartographic and E-Resources Cataloging Coordinator, University of Minnesota Libraries, and Chew Chiat Naun, Cataloging Strategist, University of Minnesota Libraries.

The University of Minnesota Libraries documented and analyzed types of errors in vendor-supplied batchloaded records for electronic book collections. This presentation describes specific error types detected and the methods developed for identifying and correcting errors, including use of the MARC Edit tool. It also discusses unresolved issues in quality control for batchloaded records, and proposes some potential larger-scale solutions.

“Fast, but Accurate? Pitfalls of Batch Metadata Editing,” presented by Kathryn Lybarger, Coordinator of Cataloging and Metadata, University of Kentucky.

A discussion of problems and inconsistencies in MARC records for electronic resource packages that may be unexpected and difficult to reconcile using batch processes. Includes tips on how to process record batches to help maintain an accurate catalog, while taking advantage of the efficiency enabled by batch editing.

“Separate, Merged, and Separate Once Again: Un-mulvering the Mulvered Records” presented by Lucas Mak, Metadata and Catalog Librarian, Michigan State University Libraries. Mak will describe how he used XSLT (Extensible Stylesheet Language Transformation) to automate the process of separating 7,400 single records for theses that described both the print and microform versions into separate records for each format.

“Cooperative Quality Control for Cataloging: Initiatives in Error Handling” presented by Ian Fairclough, Cataloging & Metadata Services Librarian, George Mason University. Fairclough will review cooperative initiatives he has undertaken with OCLC and electronic distribution lists he created to further the cooperative resolution of cataloging errors.

“Towards Better Discovery of Video Materials” presented by Cathy Weng, Head of Cataloging and Yuji Tosaka, Cataloging/Metadata Librarian, The College of New Jersey Library. Weng and Tosaka will illustrate how enhancements were made to catalog records to improve the discovery of video materials.

Catalogers and metadata librarians have been hearing a lot about the new data environment they will be joining, and how shifts from "record-level" to ‘statement-level’ management will be a part of this evolution. But what exactly is ‘statement-level management’ of metadata and how does it work? Diane Hillmann, who learned about this concept when she was part of the NSDL (National Science Digital Library) Project, will talk about how managing statements instead of records has significant potential for us as we begin to think of ourselves as consumers as well as providers of data.

Envisioning and Integrating New Cataloging WorkflowsSusan A. Massey (Head of Discovery Enhancement, Thomas G. Carpenter Library, University of North Florida)

When I arrived at the University of North Florida, the library was in the process of initiating several new workflows that would impact cataloging staff, including a new digitization unit that would need metadata services, the purchase of large e-book packages that required batch editing and loading into the catalog, the purchase of software for internal web-based documentation, and the purchase of a web-scale discovery service that entailed new ways of accessing library materials. I embarked on a reorganization process that involved creating cataloging workflow charts, performing a task analysis for each workflow, assessing staff and task competencies and reorganizing workflows for more efficient functioning of the department. The reorganization was intended to free staff time to address the newly developing technical services workflow streams such as metadata for the new digital repository and batch loading of electronic resources, but it also helped to identify training and documentation needs to incorporate changes in norms coming from the external cataloging standards environment.

Batch Processing of E-Resource Records in a Local and Consortial Environment: Streamlining Cataloging Workflow at Kent State UniversityRoman S. Panchyshyn (Catalog Librarian, Kent State University)

Batch processing of e-book and e-serial MARC records for both our local Innovative catalog and our consortial central catalog is one of the core services provided and maintained by staff in the library’s technical services department. Building on the work of Annie Wu and Anne M. Mitchell (Library Resources & Technical Services, vol. 54, no. 3 [July 2010]), KSU is developing a checklist process that records decision points for each project and documents workflow processes for departmental reference and consultation. The use of this checklist system provides a variety of benefits for our staff and for our users, both locally and consortially including a document trail, the duplicate prevention in our consortial catalog, guidelines for training staff, and quantifiable data that the Library can use for future research and decision making.

Collection Development Librarians of Academic Libraries Interest Group

Saturday, January 21, 2012, 4–5:30 p.m.Dallas Convention Center D173

Please join us for a discussion about transformative collections! The ALCTS Transforming Collections Task Force was formed to consider how ALCTS can best address ALA’s goal of “providing leadership in the transformation of libraries and library services in a dynamic and increasing global digital information environment.” Members of the task force will update us on their work to date, detailing some of their proposals for how ALCTS and ALA can promote transformative collections. Their report is online at http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/alcts/ianda/transcol/0611report.cfm

We will discuss their ideas and offer additional input. Following the task force’s update, the group will discuss collection development trends we feel are transformative, sharing our experiences and gaining new ideas we can implement in our own libraries.

Collection Evaluation & Assessment Interest Group

Sunday, January 22, 2012, 1:30–3:30 p.m.Dallas Convention Center D220

You are invited to participate in a discussion of tools and techniques utilized to evaluate library collections. There will be two presentations and plenty of time for questions and discussion:

Chan Li from the California Digital Library (CDL) will describe a new value-based strategy used by the CDL for the UC Libraries which involves using objective metrics to compare the value of scholarly journals, establish price containment targets, and identify titles to consider for potential cancellation. A key aspect of this new methodology is the use of a Weighted Value Algorithm to assess multiple vectors of value for each journal title under review.

Ruth Fischer of Sustainable Collection Services (SCS) will use examples from libraries to describe how the services and tools developed by SCS can assist librarians to draw down large collections of under-used print monographs when faced with limited space.

The charge of the CMS Collection Evaluation and Assessment Interest Group is:

To identify and promote useful qualitative and quantitative assessment measures that provide management information for the assessment of library collections both in the local setting and on the national and international level. To promote better utilization of existing assessment measures available from vendors or publishers, as well as those developed by libraries. To provide guidance to collection managers using assessment information to improve the management of electronic, print, and other library resources.

Collection Management and Electronic Resources Interest Group

This is a newly formed interest group open to anyone with an interest in collection development and electronic resources. We will discuss topics of interest to the group and pursue projects that we determine are needed in this area. Please join us for our inaugural meeting and bring your ideas and enthusiasm. Everyone is welcome!

Collection Management in Public Libraries Interest Group

Monday, January 23, 2012, 1:30–3:30 p.m.Dallas Convention Center D172

Issues relating to Collection Management will be discussed, particularly e-media and current trends in Collection Management.Contact co-chairs Peggy Murphy (pmurphy@lapl.org) and Charlene Rue (C.Rue@brooklynpubliclibrary.org) for more information.

College & Research Libraries Interest Group

Sunday, January 22, 2012, 8:30–10 a.m.Dallas Convention Center D227

As budgets tighten and as title-focused and demand-driven acquisition models gain in popularity, conventional “big deal” publisher packages are falling under increased scrutiny. Are these packages a good investment? What processes are libraries using to make decisions about publisher package renewals/cancellations? How does the process of a “big deal” discontinuation work? And, perhaps most importantly—what are the impacts?

Please join us at the ALCTS Continuing Resources Section College & Research Libraries Interest Group as we consider these questions!

As of press time, we have two confirmed speakers who will share with us there experiences and perspectives on “big deal” discontinuations:

Beth Bernhardt (Electronic Resources Librarian at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro)

David Fowler (Head, Licensing, Grants Administration & Collection Analysis at the University of Oregon)

Competencies and Education for a Career in Cataloging Interest Group

Friday, January 20, 2012, 4–5:15 p.m.Dallas Convention Center A304

Effective Succession Planning and Strategies to Identify and Prepare New Managers for Cataloging and Metadata Departments

The need to plan for succession planning in an environment that is losing its cataloging and metadata department leaders challenges libraries of all types and sizes. Guest presenter April Grey will present an overview of her experiences coming into the University of Louisiana at Lafayette as the Head of Cataloging with minimal library experience, heading a department where 80 percent of the staff have more than twenty years’ experience. She will discuss the successes, challenges and the plan for changes in the future.

Members will discuss the current state of increasing vacancies for cataloging and metadata department managers and explore the requirements, experience, and challenges of this emerging trend.

What’s a cataloger to do if headings or the entire bibliographic record is coded as RDA? This presentation will review LC decisions for its own staff, and share information about the documentation and training materials that are available on the Library of Congress’ web page that are relevant to copy cataloging with RDA.

CIP Metadata for E-booksKarl Debus-López, Chief of the U.S. General Division and Acting Chief of the U.S. and Publisher Liaison Division at the Library of Congress, will present information on the Library of Congress’ new pilot project to create cataloging in publication metadata for electronic books that are simultaneously published with their print equivalents. The rationale for providing pre-publication metadata for electronic books will be discussed, as will the scope of the pilot and the process created by the Library of Congress to create the metadata. Library of Congress created CIP e-book pre-publication data for the pilot participants is currently available in OCLC for use by libraries and vendors as a source of copy cataloging.

Copy Cataloging Gets Some Respect From AdministratorsElaine A. Franco, Principal Cataloger, Cataloging & Metadata Services, University of California, Davis, will discuss how her library has “rebranded” copy cataloging to show its value to administrators. At the University of California, Davis, there is very little “easy” copy cataloging these days. Much of what would have been handled by beginning copy catalogers is now outsourced for shelf-ready processing. The loss of librarian positions over the last few years has meant that copy catalogers are taking more responsibility for complex copy cataloging. Copy catalogers at UCDavis are now authorized and trained to edit OCLC master records, a capability previously limited to original catalogers. As a result, UCDavis is now seeing a dramatic rise in its OCLC credits.

Questions following the discussions are encouraged.

Creative Ideas in Technical Services Interest Group

Sunday, January 22, 2012, 4–5:30 p.m.Dallas Convention Center D220

Technical services, like any other department in a library, is faced with the need to increase efficiencies so that it can purchase and catalog material as fast as possible, in order to meet the needs of today’s users. Some technical services departments across the United States have embraced these efficiencies by implementing services such as: Patron Driven Acquisitions, Group wide License Negation, and Rapid Cataloging in order to meet the changing needs of the library. Please join us at the ALCTS Creative Ideas in Technical Services Interest Group as we discuss how these and other efficiencies have been implemented in Technical Service Departments around the United States.

Digital Conversion Interest Group

Preservation professionals are increasingly charged with varied and complex collections that include a growing amount of moving image material. Furthermore, limited resources and technical learning curves contribute to the challenge of preserving these materials.

This session will provide practical information on the preservation of moving image materials. A panel comprised of experienced professionals will address such topics as standards and technical specifications, file formats, codecs and wrappers, metadata, data storage, and delivery for access. The session will provide equal parts theory and application, with an eye to what small to mid-sized institutions can do to implement these strategies.

This will be an opportunity to learn more about general technical matters surrounding these complex challenges, as well as an opportunity to bring specific questions and success stories to what will be a mostly “town hall” style meeting.

Time will additionally be allotted at the end of the program for discussion of the Annual Meeting’s agenda.

Digital Preservation Interest Group

Sunday, January 22, 2012, 8–10 a.m.Dallas Convention Center D171

The Future Is Now: Case Studies in Born-Digital Preservation

Are you ready to handle born-digital materials? We've talked about the future onslaught of these materials, and that future is now! Our speakers will present on-the-ground case studies of how two Texas institutions are dealing with the management of born-digital materials in special collections and archives. Dr. Patricia Galloway will discuss the work of graduate students in her Problems in the Permanent Retention of Electronic Records course, and talk about what skills are necessary for future digital archivists. Michele Reilly will talk about the process underway at the University of Houston to review existing workflows and develop new ones for born-digital material management. There will be time for discussion at the end of the presentations.

Patricia Galloway teaches courses on appraisal, digital archives, and museum studies at the School of Information, University of Texas-Austin. She holds Ph.Ds in Comparative Literature and in Anthropology from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. From 1979 to 2000 she worked at the Mississippi Department of Archives and History, where among other tasks she was the first manager of information systems and directed an National Historical Publications and Records Commission project to establish an electronic records program.

Michele Reilly earned her Master in Library Science degree from Indiana University in Bloomington (2005) with a concentration in collection development and library management. Throughout her library career she has concentrated on the preservation of digital materials, the future of digital technologies and how users are affected and interact with emerging technologies. She is the head of Digital Services at the University of Houston Libraries.

Faceted Subject Access Interest Group

Saturday, January 21, 2012, 4–5:30 p.m. Dallas Convention Center D222

Increasingly users are searching for library materials through “Next Generation Catalogs” or “Discovery Systems” which provide options to limit keyword retrieval sets by subject terms. How do our current subjects function in this context? Can standards be developed for this? What should they be?

Please join us at the ALCTS Cataloging & Metadata Management Section Faceted Subject Access Interest Group Midwinter Meeting as we consider these and related questions.

FRBR Interest Group

There is more to Functional Requirements than just FRBR. Come join us to learn more about FRAD and the other FR models from our very knowledgeable presenters, Qiang Jin and Shawne Miksa.

Qiang Jin is Senior Coordinating Cataloger and NACO Coordinator, Associate Professor of Library Administration at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Library. Her presentation will provide a basic explanation of the Functional Requirements for Authority Data (FRAD): A Conceptual Model. It will illustrate the Conceptual Model for Authority Data with specific examples, and explain the FRAD entities, attributes of those entities and relationships between those entities with many specific examples so that attendees will be able to understand the FRAD model. It will include some brief RDA authority records exemplifying the major FRAD relationships.

Shawne Miksa is an Associate Professor in the Department of Library and Information Sciences and Acting Associate Director of the Interdisciplinary Information Science PhD Program in the College of Information (COI), University of North Texas. In her presentation, Miksa will list and define the twelve user tasks from all three FR Models (FRBR, FRAD, FRSAD) and present her conception of corresponding tasks that an information organizer (cataloger, metadata specialist, etc.) performs to support the user tasks. Most of these tasks are not new to the practice, and Dr. Miksa will show how they can be recast to correspond with the functionality models.

Sharon Wiles-Young (Lehigh University): “Technical Services Involvement with New Service: Are there Silos Within the Library?”

Presentations will be followed by a panel discussion and audience Q&A. Please contact Christopher Cronin (croninc@uchicago.edu), Chair of the ALCTS Heads of Cataloging Interest Group, for more information.

Intellectual Access to Preservation Metadata Interest Group

Saturday, January 21, 2012, 4–5:30 p.m.Dallas Convention Center D171

Presenter: Joan Starr, EZID Service Manager and Manager of Strategic and Project Planning at the California Digital Library

Data, datasets, and data management are becoming an increasingly important parts of the library collection management portfolio. In this context, librarians seek new tools and approaches that support researchers in the full research life cycle. Researchers have a number of requirements: the data must be easy to find, it must give credit to the researchers, it must be citable, and, above all, any maintenance must be easy.

Good data management is the answer, and built with hardware and infrastructure but also metadata: metadata for citation, access and preservation. Making this easy is the business of new tools like EZID, a persistent identifier service from California Digital Library.

Joan Starr is the EZID Service Manager and Manager of Strategic and Project Planning at CDL, and the Chair of DataCite’s Metadata Working Group. She will provide an overview of some of the key issues in dataset metadata, and give special focus on ways that EZID can help you extend your collection-building activities to datasets, allowing you to preserve your institution’s research investments.

ALCTS/LITA Linked Library Data Interest Group

The midwinter meeting of the Linked Library Data Interest Group will include one hour of informal discussion followed by a thirty-minute business meeting. The meeting will open with updates from the chairs on recent developments in the LLD landscape, and attendees will be invited to give brief lightning talks. This will be followed by a short summary of Friday’s “Libraries, Linked Data and the Semantic Web” institute and a discussion of topics arising from this event. The business meeting portion will primarily be focused on planning the proposed ALCTS Annual preconference.

ALCTS/LITA MARC Formats Interest Group

Saturday, January 21, 2012, 4–6 p.m.Dallas Convention Center C149

What Lies Beyond MARC?

The Library of Congress has announced its Bibliographic Framework Initiative, which includes plans to find a successor to the MARC format. What problems do we want the new framework to solve? How might new technologies influence our practices? How do these developments relate to the introduction of RDA?

New Members Interest Group

Are you a new ALCTS member or interested in becoming a member? Please join the ALCTS New Members Interest Group for a brief overview of ALCTS and opportunity to network with other new members and veteran members. Before attending the meeting, please register to be a mentor or mentee at http://bit.ly/s9RvPJ. Anyone unable to register before the meeting is still welcome, and may be matched depending on availability of other mentors or mentees. For more information, please contact chair-elect Liz Siler at liz.siler@gmail.com, or chair Amy Jackson at amyjacks@unm.edu.

Public Libraries Technical Services Interest Group

Saturday, January 21, 2012, 7–10 a.m.OMNI - Greenville Avenue

The ALCTS Public Libraries Technical Services Interest Group will be meeting at ALA Midwinter in conjunction with the OCLC Dewey breakfast. The PLTSIG portion of the meeting will start at roughly 8:30 a.m. We encourage everyone to come and hear what’s new with Dewey, and stay for the meeting. At Midwinter we usually have a round-table discussion of timely topics or issues in the technical services area specific to public libraries, and brainstorm ideas for an actual planned topic of discussion or presentation at Annual. This Midwinter, Donna Cranmer, PLTSIG Chair, will also be soliciting volunteers as vice chair, since the person chosen for that role in New Orleans has accepted a position in a special library and resigned.

Now that PLTSIG has been established for several years, it’s time for an official mailing list for the group. It you are interested in keeping an eye on the activities of the group, and want to know more about our meetings, sign up for our discussion list. Visit http://lists.ala.org/sympa, and search for alcts-publibtechserv or go to http://lists.ala.org/sympa/info/alcts-publibtechserv to sign up. A large amount of traffic isn’t expected; just flurries prior to and right after ALA meetings.

Role of the Professional Librarian in Technical Services Interest Group

We know that we want to have perpetual access clauses in our licenses and we know that publishers will provide them, but what are we actually getting with our perpetual access rights? In this informal group setting, we will discuss the results of our examination of perpetual access clauses from twenty of the Texas A&M University Libraries’ licenses for our major journal packages, including the impact on our electronic resources and serials workflows; the potential impact on the acquisitions and cataloging staff; and how perpetual access affects our current and/or future functions as technical services librarians. We will present a chart comparing the perpetual access rights offered by the twenty publishers and we will then open the discussion to the audience to learn how librarians at other institutions deal with perpetual access.

Technical Services Managers in Academic Libraries Interest Group

Please join us for lively table discussions on these topics of current interest:

RDA

Acquisitions and serials in evolution

Changes in technical services staffing, training, and prioritization of workloads as libraries turn their focus increasingly to electronic and digital resources

How do we as managers develop the necessary mindset to lead change as libraries move in new directions?

What are the new skills current cataloging staff will need in the next few years and how can we provide training for them?

DDA, social tagging, and other end-user driven trends affecting our work. What are the implications for the future of tech services?

Technical Services Workflow Efficiency Interest Group

Monday January 23, 2012, 1:30–3:30 p.m.Dallas Convention Center D227

With constant budget cuts libraries are focusing on digitizing their unique and special collections. More metadata is now being created in house by staff that formerly only did traditional cataloging. The panelists will discuss their approaches to transitioning staff away from traditional cataloging and towards metadata. Learn from this panel how libraries have trained traditional cataloging staff to create metadata for their digital collections as part of their normal cataloging workflows and any obstacles or lessons learned during the transition to this new type of cataloging. The digital collections discussed will include institutional repositories, oral histories, museum collections and archival collections of all shapes and sizes.

Panelists include Ann Ellis, Metadata Librarian at Stephen F Austin State University; Morag Boyd, Head, Special Collections Cataloging at The Ohio State University; Teressa Keenan, Metadata Librarian at The University of Montana; and Vicki Sipe, Catalog Librarian, University of Maryland, Baltimore County.